Talk:Manticore

Latest comment: 3 years ago by Tabbycatlove in topic Dinosaurs?

Image edit

Perhaps a better picture will suit, the first manticore pic looks more like a chinese new year lion on a bad day The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.234.227.185 (talk • contribs) January 29, 2006, 22:05 UTC.

You want I should draw one? I'm pretty good.

I would recommend a change of picture. The first paragraph of text says that "The tail is either of a dragon or a scorpion." The manticore in the picture has a lion's tail. Should the picture be changed to fit the given description? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.142.184.211 (talk) 07:12, 22 February 2008 (UTC)Reply

Cryptozoölogy? edit

(thus confusing its imagery with the cryptozoology of a porcupine...). This part is confusing. As far as I know, porcupines are not cryptozoological. Perhaps someone that knows what it's supposed to mean can come along and clear this up? The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.53.49.21 (talk • contribs) December 14, 2005, 08:45 UTC.

I think it means cryptozoology about the real porcupine, similar to how there's a lot of myths regarding the evil-spirit-warding powers of things like roosters and weasels. Some people used to believe porcupines could shoot quills

Charmed edit

I don't know much aboot it, but manticores appear in at least one episode of Charmed. If anyone knows anything aboot the show, or knows how to find out more about the manticores in it, that would make a nice addition to the list at the bottom, IMHO. Tomertalk 15:06, 6 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

According to the Charmed wiki, creatures called manticores only appeared in one episode and they don't seem to have anything in common with the manticore in this article.Fyrael (talk) 16:40, 16 August 2010 (UTC)Reply

Where'd it all go? edit

This article used to have a lot more to it, now it's a stub! [unsigned]

Origin edit

Wiley Ley speculated that the original stories of the manticore were based on 3rd or 4th generation tales of tigers with a bit of Asiatic lion mixed in. CFLeon (talk) 22:25, 18 November 2007 (UTC)Reply

Legacy edit

It said: "Nowadays, the manticore is said by the natives to inhabit the forests of Asia, particularly Indonesia. ... " and so on. I am from Indonesia but I have never heard this thing or I don't know what it's spell in Indonesian. Plese provide the refernce, thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ndrasen (talkcontribs) 05:54, 3 September 2008 (UTC)Reply

Emptees? edit

This article is about the mythical beast. Why some small group of t-shirt designers warrant inclusion in this article I'm not sure. Wikipedia is not your personal promotion platform, nor is it a directory of relevant services. If nobody objects with a semi-decent rationale, I move to delete the section "Real Life Applications" and promotional links to the Emptees site. Mhoskins (talk) 19:30, 4 September 2008 (UTC)Reply

Merger proposal edit

Given we have appearances from ancient thru modern in popular legend of this fictional creature, this was a needless and arbitrary split in the first place. Regardless of validity of content, I think the material in not distinct or notable enough to warrant a separate page. Casliber (talk · contribs) 19:58, 15 May 2009 (UTC)Reply

Support edit

  1. Casliber (talk · contribs) 19:59, 15 May 2009 (UTC)Reply
  2. The material does need some kind of verification/notation as to its significance though; possibly a lot of it can be discarded. Шизомби (talk) 21:13, 15 May 2009 (UTC)Reply
  3. Support "merge," but really only a couple of things on the other article are notable enough to be moved over and the rest should be deleted as triviacruft. DreamGuy (talk) 21:24, 15 May 2009 (UTC)Reply
  4. Support, per DreamGuy. Once the triviacruft is removed, what remains can be added back to the main article. No need for a split in the first place, and no discussion on the part of the editor who performed it. ---RepublicanJacobiteThe'FortyFive' 15:21, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
  5. Support merger, acknowledging that some of the items to be merged are at best dubiously notable and may not, in fact, necessarily qualify for inclusion in the merged article, as per DreamGuy. John Carter (talk) 15:04, 19 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

Oppose edit

  • Oppose deletion merger There is no way to merge that much information into the main article. Most of it would be deleted. Preserve, don't destroy. It is notable to see how a mythical creature appeared in so many stories throughout history. Dream Focus 22:02, 3 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
  • Oppose, none of it is needed here. Let it exist as it is. Mintrick (talk) 22:19, 3 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

Discussion edit

My worry is that this page is more vulnerable to being deleted as is (i.e. on its own) than combined into parent article. As well, there is no clear line between ancient and modern. I wasn't meaning a deletion merger by any means. Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:21, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

If the material is bad enough to be deleted, then it should be deleted, not hidden in another article. If that's you're worry, I suggest you remove all unreferenced appearances and restructure the article around cited analysis. That, of course, would be starting from the beginning. Mintrick (talk) 00:33, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
It is not 'hidden' by being in a main article - my point is this completely arbitrary and unnecessary splitting of articles that you have embarked upon. And yes, if there are a couple of notable appearances but the consensus is to delete the article as a whole, then they are more likely to remain in the pedia. Casliber (talk · contribs) 03:45, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
There is no way it'd be deleted, as long as you have at least a handful of people there to say Keep. Then you'll get a no consensus, at the very least. I've seen articles like that preserved before, and will fight to keep it should anyone ever nominate it for deletion. If that information was copied to the main article, someone would come along and tag it as trivia, then try to destroy it. Best to keep it where its at now. Dream Focus 12:38, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
Ok, in arms, brother :) Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:45, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
Apparently DF is saying that he'll do whatever it takes to keep the info, despite it not meeting our content policies. I've seen plenty of those deleted before, and just because DF votes Keep on everything he sees doesn't mean everything ends up kept. Quite the contrary, in fact. DreamGuy (talk) 13:50, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
Oh DG, don't be such a wet blanket :( I keep promising to try and dig up some stuff, I know. I will remove some spam though :) Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:54, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
There was no consensus to merge, or destroy outright and add in a redirect, and yet on his own DreamGuy decided to do so, effectively destroying the other article. I'm going to go undo that now. Form a proper consensus, and stop bothering it. Also, you don't need references to confirm those sources mentioned had a manticore in them. If you think the article has merit to exist, then you can nominate it for deletion through the proper procedures. Dream Focus 14:22, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
Okay. Sorry Mintrick for the rollback. meant to hit 'undo' with commentary. I am digging up some sources. Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:46, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
  • Casliber do you want to move your name from the Support to the Oppose section? Dream Focus 16:19, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
I still think they are better together than split - one article is plent big enough for all. I will hunt down some more sources later. Note merge does not mean delete. I do think some articles warrant a separate cultural article when they are big enough, but most aren't, and there is no clear boundary between ancient and modern pop culture. Think fo Dante, Aesop's fables, shakespeare, various Roman writers, psychology etc. the split is in general not valid. Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:33, 5 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

pop culture material - placed here while sources are found edit

OK, rather than get in a revert war over unsourced material, I have placed it here and material can be transferred once reliable sources are found: Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:15, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply


Books edit

  • In the book by Rick Riordan, The Titan's Curse, the manticore, named Dr. Thorn, is the headmaster of a military school. Thorn was later killed by the Greek god Dionysus.
  • In Salman Rushdie's novel The Satanic Verses, one of the characters has a short series of encounters with what he calls a manticore in the streets of Jahilia, an ancient Arabian town which is the setting of some of the flashback-dream sequences.
  • In Dante's Inferno, Dante and Virgil descend to the 8th circle on the back of Geryon, a Manticore. Here the manticore is a symbol of fraud with a human face to depict the uniquely human nature of the sin.
  • Piers Anthony's first Xanth novel, A Spell for Chameleon, features a manticore guarding the Good Magician Humphrey's magical demesnes, and poses one of the challenges protagonist Bink must pass to meet the wizard. The paperback printed by Del Rey features this scene with the manticore on the cover.
  • Canadian writer Robertson Davies wrote a novel entitled The Manticore, published in 1972. It is the second volume of his "Deptford trilogy," which begins with Fifth Business and concludes with World of Wonders. The manticore figures into protagonist David's psycho-analysis under Jungian analyst Dr. VonHaller. David's dream of the manticore is reflective of himself and the roles he plays interacting with other people and society. reffed and added - was an award-winning book Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:40, 4 June 2009 (UTC)Reply
  • In the Honorverse novels by David Weber, the Star Kingdom of Manticore is a fictional nation. The three habitable planets in the Manticore system bear the names Manticore, Sphinx, and Gryphon, references to chimerical beasts.
  • In the Japanese series Boogiepop (as well as Boogiepop and Others and Boogiepop Phantom), the manticore is portrayed as a clone made by the Towa Organization. Manticore escaped from them, and sought to hide itself in Shinyo Academy by taking the form of a student, where it killed and devoured several others.
  • A manticore appears in the Percy Jackson & The Olympians series. He is portrayed as having "enormous claws". He was described as "his face still human, but his body that of a huge lion. His leathery, spiky tail whipped deadly thorns in all directions". This manticore was capable of disguising himself as a human.
  • A manticore is one of the mythical creatures represented in Mommy Fortuna's carnival in the book The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle. The manticore is eventually revealed to be merely a lion with a magic spell placed on it to trick viewers.
  • In Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, while Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and, Hermione Granger are researching for the defense of Buckbeak the Hippogriff, Ron finds a case of a manticore savaging a person in 1296. The manticore was found "not guilty", due to the fact that everyone was too afraid to go near it.
  • In A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin, Daenerys is attacked by a manticore. In this case, a poisonous insect or arachnid with a human-like face.
  • In John Ney Reiber's version of the comic book The Books of Magic, The Manticore is one of Timothy Hunter's first and greatest foes. It wears a human skin as a disguise, but its triple rows of teeth are visible when it smiles. Though a fantastic creature itself, it employs cold logic to disprove the existence of magical creatures, killing them through banality and placing them in a museum. This latter methodology calls to mind the lethal force of Banality in the White Wolf game Changeling: The Dreaming. It should noted that Reiber's interpretation of the Manticore predates this game by several years.
  • In the Spiderwick universe, manticores are cougar-like creatures with the heads of bearded men, tails of poisoned spikes and melodious voices. They are famous man-killers.
  • Manticores make several appearances in Roger Zelazny's Amber Series.
  • Grotteschi the Red is a manticore in the second novel in Catherynne M. Valente's The Orphan's Tales: In the Cities of Coin and Spice. The manticores sing and are born of the Upas tree as helpless babies, and are frequently captured and caged.
  • In Orson Scott Card's novel Ender's Game, one of the Battle School armies is named Manticore.

Television edit

  • In the television show Charmed, manticores are vicious demons that, according to the Book of Shadows, have supernatural strength and venomous claws. They communicate in high-pitched cries and tend to travel in packs.
  • In the Power Rangers Mystic Force series the Legend Mode's Megazord is called the Manticore Megazord and has the body of a lion and the head of human.
  • "Manticore" was the name of the fictional military project/facility in the Fox Network's television series, Dark Angel. The name Manticore was chosen because the company was in the business of combining DNA from several species into a single being. The title character of the series was said to possess, amongst others, feline DNA.
  • In March 2008 Stephen Colbert mentioned on his late-night talk show, The Colbert Report, that since acquiring his magical amulet he has not once been attacked by a manticore.

Films edit

  • There is also a Sci-fi Channel Original Movie called Manticore, in which the beast is depicted as a vicious man-eater with the body of a lion, the head of a bald man, and dragon or bat wings.
  • A Manticore appeared on the early scriptment for James Cameron's "Avatar" being described as a "black six-limbed panther from Hell, the size of a tractor trailer, with an armored head, a venomous striking tail, and massive distensible armored jaws. Its shiny black skin looks like polished leather, and is banded with thin stripes of yellow and scarlet. It has four powerful legs forming a base for a torso which angles up, centaur-like, to a powerful shoulder girdle. Folded against its chest are two long forearms like the striking limbs of a praying mantis. Curving up over the back is a muscular scorpion tail which ends in a scythe-like stinger, over a foot long."
  • In the movie The Last Unicorn there was an old Lion under a illusion made to look like a Manticore in traveling circus.

Video games edit

  • Manticores are enemies encountered in Cadash.
  • Manticores are enemies encountered in The Legend Of Dragoon.
  • Manticore is the name of a NPC and Contact in the MMORPG City of Heroes.
  • It is a troop unit available for hire in Heroes of Might and Magic III
  • It is a neutral creature in Heroes of Might and Magic V
  • In Titan Quest there is a Manticore in Chapter 2 in a cave. It is characterized as a legendary beast.
  • The Manticore is an enemy creature on the Sega Master System game Phantasy Star.
  • The Manticore, along with several variations, are enemies in Golden Sun.
  • In Descent: FreeSpace - The Great War, the Manticore is a class of Shivan interceptor, and is the fastest ship in the game.
  • Manticore appears as a boss monster in the Super Nintendo game Final Fantasy V.
  • Manticore is the name of a (L) unit in Vrael@USEast's Feyvern RolePlay on the online game StarCraft: Brood War.
  • Manticores and variations appear as monsters in the MMORPG game Final Fantasy XI.
  • Manticore is the name of one of the more powerful civilian / privateer vessels in the PC & Mac game from Ambrosia Software, Escape Velocity Nova.
  • Manticores were present in an early Windows video game entitled "Castle of the Winds: A Quest for Vengeance" and in its sequel "Castle of the Winds: Lifthransir's Bane"
  • Manticores were also used in Electronic Arts "Archon" 1984 which was available on several computer systems and game consoles including Atari and Commodore .
  • Sony Entertainment's Everquest Also used the Beasts In Mid Level Zone.
  • Manticores appear as flying mounts in Total Chaos.
  • A Manticore is a creature in the Castlevania video game series. It has the tail of a scorpion, wings of a bat and the body/head of a lion.
  • Manticores also appear in the popular computer game Age of Mythology and Age of Mythology: The Titans Expansion Pack.
  • In Disgaea : Hour/Afternoon of Darkness a manticore type creature appears as an enemy, when once defeated can be used as an ally
  • Manticores appear in the Online games called 'Which Way?' and 'Get lost'
  • A Manticore appears at the end of stage 2-1 of the Super Nintendo game ActRaiser
  • In the card-based action role-playing game Lost Kingdoms II there is a manticore card.
  • In the MMORPG EVE Online there is a Caldari Stealth Bomber class ship called "Manticore"
  • Manticores also make a random appearance in the RPG Tales of Eternia.
  • In the role-playing game Valkyrie Profile for Sony's PSX, the Manticore is a recurrent enemy at Lezard's Tower dungeon.
  • Manticores are tamable monsters in the RPG Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World
  • Manticores occasionally appear in Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, as Dark Elf pets for instance.
  • https://www.google.gr/search?client=aff-maxthon-maxthon4&channel=t26&q=mtg+manticore&gws_rd=cr&dcr=0&ei=Sk69WrbOFKHm6ASj2bnICQ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.203.220.160 (talk) 20:37, 29 March 2018 (UTC)Reply

Miscellaneous edit

  • The Unicorn, the Gorgon, and the Manticore is the title of a cantata by Gian Carlo Menotti The three creatures described in the story are depicted as fanciful and benign, not as monsters.
  • In Stephen Sondheim's fairytale musical Into the Woods, the manticore is mentioned as a possibility for what destroyed the Baker's house. The Witch dismisses it as imaginary.
  • Manticore is referenced by Clutch (band) singer Neil Fallon in the song "Circus Maximus" from the 2005 album Robot Hive/Exodus.
  • Tycho Brahe mentions manticores in a strip of the webcomic Penny Arcade.[1]
  • Leeds Surrealist Group, in the UK, published a four page A3 bulletin, called 'Manticore: Surrealist Communication' between 1997 and 2006 (eight issues).
  • Manticore Records is the name of the record label launched by the progressive rock band Emerson, Lake and Palmer during the early 70s. It is derived from the inner gatefold sleeve of the album Tarkus by ELP and shows a series of pictures depicting battles between Tarkus and other half-mechanical creatures, until its eventual defeat by a manticore. "Tarkus" then becomes "Aquatarkus", an aquatic version of the land-bound original.
  • In the Star Wars expanded universe, Imperial Admiral Daala commanded a small fleet of Star Destroyers whose names were taken from various legendary creatures: Manticore, Basilisk, Hydra, and Gorgon.
  • In the Warhammer Fantasy setting, Manticores are vicious creatures of Chaos. They are sometimes ridden into war by the Dark Elves, who see Manticores as holy creatures of their god Khaine.
  • In the YU-GI-OH! trading card game there is a card called Manticore of Darkness.

Baricos? edit

The article says the mythical creature is called Baricos/Bárikos (Βάρικος; "Βάρἰκος" is obviously mispelled) in Greek language; I could find no reference for this, neither on Google nor in my Greek dictionaries. The most similar word I could find is the adjective βαρύκομπος (barýkompos), found in Pindar, Pythian 5.57, where it means 'loud-roaring (lions)' (βαρύκομποι λέοντες)--Carnby (talk) 18:14, 1 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

Βαρκός - Βαρύς, swamp thing maybe http://www.enacademic.com/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.203.220.160 (talk) 20:26, 29 March 2018 (UTC)Reply

Etymology edit

My Greek dictionary (Montanari) says μαρτιχόρας (martichóras) comes from Persian mardom-xār, meaning 'man-eater, tiger'.--Carnby (talk) 18:14, 1 January 2012 (UTC)Reply

Alleged Pictish manticore image removed edit

I'm sorry, but just because an author of a book on Picts makes some bizarre claim that an image is a manticore, despite it looking nothing like one and the author having no background in the topic, doesn't mean Wikipedia has to include it. Plus the image is very poor quality to begin with. There's absolutely no reason for its inclusion here. The only person supporting it has been the person who took the photo. I'm thinking the edit has more to do with vanity than any serious effort to contribute to this topic. DreamGuy (talk) 19:11, 11 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

First of all, the contributor who keeps posting that image should quote the passage by Anna Ritchie in this discussion page; besides, he should find other references to that pic, since the picture is bad and it is not clear at all that it really shows a manticore.--Carnby (talk) 19:29, 11 February 2012 (UTC)Reply

Another alleged manticore image removed edit

Similar to the above, I removed text and an image claiming a manticore was on a wall, when it was clearly a centaur or some other similar creature. The book being used as a reference was by an author who is not an expert on mythical creatures, and it appeared to be one of those paranormal type WP:FRINGE books. DreamGuy (talk) 16:59, 6 January 2013 (UTC)Reply

an heraldic edit

An IP has just changed "an heraldic tiger" to "a heraldic tiger" with the justification "You only use 'an' before a word that starts with 'h' if the 'h' is silent, meaning that the word sounds as if it starts with a vowel". I'm not going to get into an edit war over this, but I want to put on record that this statement is complete bollocks. There's a long tradition of saying and writing "an heraldic ..." (as there is of saying and writing "an historic ...", "an heroic ...", etc), and both "a" and "an" are equally correct and acceptable. The Wikipedia article on Coat of arms, for example, defines a coat of arms as "an heraldic visual design ...". For a lengthy discussion, see here. GrindtXX (talk) 16:50, 25 December 2017 (UTC)Reply

Dinosaurs? edit

The spiked tails sound a whole lot like ankylosaurs or stegasaurs. Fossils? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tabbycatlove (talkcontribs) 14:43, 20 August 2020 (UTC)Reply